On Bharat Bhagya Vidhata, Sharad Yadav, the current MP from Madhepura constituency in Bihar says current economic policies are not geared to reduce vast income disparity despite India being a resource rich nation. Growth is not happening because of poor water management.

Zee Research Group/ Delhi

New Delhi: Sharad Yadav says that India has all the necessary resources to deal with country’s innumerable challenges but lacks effective planning. Not surprisingly, even after six decades of independence, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer.

The national president of JD (U) in an exclusive Zara Hat Ke chat with Zee Media guest anchor Ashutosh Rana dwelt at length on India’s gloomy income disparity and made a fervent appeal to focus on policies keeping Indian realities in mind.

According to the Planning Commission report on poverty estimates, at all-India level in 2011-2012; BPL (Below Poverty Line) population was 21.9 per cent (almost 270 million). This means every fifth Indian lives below the poverty line. On an all-India basis, there were 217 million poor in rural areas and 53 million poor in urban areas in 2011-12, as against 326 million and 81 million, respectively, in 2004-05.

Also as per the World Bank estimates, India now has a greater share of the worlds poorest than it did thirty years ago. Then it was home to one fifth of the world`s poorest people, but today it accounts for one-third – (400 million).

“The government’s economic policies have failed to end income disparities,” lamented Yadav on Zee Media.

“Our country has huge water resources but the resources have not been utilised logically. Further we have not been able to uplift the agro based industries. Irrigation and water management system in the country remains poor,” added Yadav.

Yadav averred that politicians are only interested in making such policies which can improve their electoral performance.

“Caste- based violence and vote bank politics in the name of caste and creed have led to the ever growing disparity,” said Yadav on Zee Media.

Yadav, however, has a different take on the just passed Food Security Bill as a measure to redistribute resources to the poor.

“There are lots of flaws in the Food Security Bill and it will never reach to the poor,” opined Yadav.

Corruption is eating into India’s growth thereby perpetuating poverty. Supporting the view, Yadav told #bbv, “Indian politics is based on family politics and corruption at every level has worsened the situation.”

Offering solutions to check the problem of economic disparity in India, Yadav in his Zara Hat Ke #bbv interview said, “The need of the hour is to end the social disparity and caste based politics. We shouldn’t blindly ape the west in economic policymaking. In other words, economic policies should be made keeping Indian realities in mind.”